Site You Should Know About

New Site You Should Know About: Teaching Tolerance, a project of the Southern Poverty Law Center, is a wonderful site that includes a variety of classroom activities and teaching kits that can be used to help teach students about tolerance. Included in the website is the DVD Bullied: A Student, a School and a Case That Made History. For any school counselors who have not seen this DVD, I implore you, GO SEE IT NOW. Order your free copy from this website! It truly is an important message about tolerance that we all need to remember. You can order your free copy and learn more about the DVD here: http://www.tolerance.org/bullied.

In addition, take some time to learn more about the amazing organization that is the Southern Poverty Law Center. They have some amazing resources that can be helpful to school counselors that can be located here: http://www.splcenter.org/get-informed/publications, including:

Release Statement from GLSEN, PFLAG, and the Trevor Project on Recent Tragedies

In relation to my last post, I wanted to share this Release Statement emailed last night from LGBTQ organizations on the recent tragedies of several LGBTQ youth due to bullying. Hopefully you will find it inspiring and useful as I did.

Note of Caution: In an effort not to sensationalize these events, GLSEN is refraining from posting this statement to our social networking sites, including Facebook, Myspace, Twitter, etc. We ask that you please take the same caution to reduce the risk of future tragedies.

Recently, there has been heightened media attention surrounding the suicides in New Jersey,Texas, California, Indiana, and Minnesota of several youth who were known to be bullied relentlessly because of their actual or perceived sexual orientation or gender identity.

These horrific stories across the country reflect on school bullying culture and how it can lead to tragedy. Such cases are not new, but actually do reveal an important trend: the public is becoming more informed and in tune to the realities that adversely affect our youth. However, it is now up to the public to not just be aware, but to be active in changing this reality.

LGBTQ Teens and Suicide

Read a tragic article today. A gay teen at Rutgers University committed suicide after his roommate posted video of him on the internet making out with another male student. The article raised some interesting issues and provided video commentary as well. Take a look: http://abcnews.go.com/US/victim-secret-dorm-sex-tape-commits-suicide/story?id=11758716

The video mentioned Dan Savage's You Tube project "It Get's Better" located here: http://www.youtube.com/user/itgetsbetterproject which is a collection of videos from LGBTQ adults sending messages of hope to LGBTQ youth assuring them that even though they may be experiencing bullying and other discouraging behaviors now, "it will get better." This may be a helpful resource to school counselors working with LGBTQ youth who are feeling discouraged and are looking for a message of hope.

Working with LGBTQ Families

Six to twelve million children in the United States come from LGBTQ families, yet unfortunately the research exists indicating that school counselors are sorely lacking in their knowledge and abilities to serve this population. An important goal is to help children become aware and knowledgeable (and, in my opinion, accepting) of all types of diverse families.

To help in this process, if you're school district is willing, I recommend Todd Parr's book, "The Family Book" which includes depictions of all types of families, including those with two same-sex parents.

Also, if you're interested in this topic, check out the paper I wrote for my multicultural class in the resources section. It is entitled "Considerations for School Counselors working with LGBT Families."

Special Population #3: LGBTQ

LGBTQ persons also face unique challenges in the workforce, including how to come out on their resume and whether or not to do so, how to come out in the workforce, finding companies that support LGBTQ workers and provide domestic partner benefits, finding work in states that support LGBTQ rights, and more. Check out the following resources for working with this population. Also check out my resources folders for a group counseling framework for working with this population.

LGBTQ:

Human Rights Campaign State of the Workforce: http://www.hrc.org/about_us/7061.htm

HRC Employer Database: http://www.hrc.org/issues/workplace/search.asp?form=private_quick_search.aspx

HRC Corporate Equality Index: http://www.hrc.org/issues/cei.htm

•Gay Financial Network: http://www.gfn.com/

•Queer Resources Directory: http://www.qrd.org/qrd/

•Gay Yellow Pages: http://gayellowpages.com

•LGBT Career Link: http://www.lgbtcareerlink.com/

•Out Professionals: http://www.outprofessionals.org/